


Wheel of Westeros Book Three: Rise of the Raven Part Four

by Thrafrau (annmcbee)



Series: Wheel of Westeros [21]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Castle Black, Episode: s07e03 The Queen's Justice, Eventual Jon Snow/Daenerys Targaryen, King Jon Snow, Skagos, Three-Eyed Raven Bran Stark, Werewolf Jon Snow, Winterfell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-13
Updated: 2020-07-13
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:27:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25249174
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/annmcbee/pseuds/Thrafrau
Summary: Bran visits his grandmother's death bed, and her dying words to Lyanna are strange. Jon marches North to save his Freefolk brothers and sisters in the Night's Watch from a terrible fate, and makes a promise to Daenerys Targaryen. Griff makes a move that gets him badly hurt, and Bloodraven's plan must change. Jaime arrives to confess his crime to the Lady of Winterfell, but Arya finds use for him.
Relationships: Bran Stark & Ned Stark, Jaime Lannister & Arya Stark, Jaime Lannister & Rhaegar Targaryen, Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth, Jon Snow & Aegon VI Targaryen, Long Haul Jon/Daenerys, Lyanna Stark & Lyarra Stark, Meera Reed/Bran Stark, Satin Flowers & Jon Snow, Satin Flowers/Loras Tyrell
Series: Wheel of Westeros [21]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1458574
Comments: 10
Kudos: 10





	Wheel of Westeros Book Three: Rise of the Raven Part Four

**_The Wheel of Westeros_ **

**Book Three: Rise of the Raven Part Four**

_Disclaimer:_

_This fan fiction is meant neither to be a continuation of George R. R. Martin’s_ A Song of Ice and Fire _series, nor a revision of seasons 6-8 of the HBO series,_ Game of Thrones _. It is meant to stand alone, independent of those works, and can be read alone by those who have not seen the TV series or read the books. Having said that, this work will borrow from not only_ Game of Thrones _and_ A Song of Ice and Fire, _but from multiple other works of film, television, music and literature. Please see footnotes for references, and feel free to point out any I’ve forgotten._

Chapter 1: The Grandson

Bran can still warg, he’s found, which means the Raven cannot. That’s good, but it doesn’t mean Bran can warg back into his body. Where he is, he can’t truly warg. It’s more like his wolf dreams, in which he could see through Summer’s eyes, but not control what he did. He had eaten human flesh in that state. He enjoyed every bite. That taste still haunts him.

When the past keeps coming in, intruding, frightening, hurting – that’s called haunting. But what is it when the future barges in on someone’s present? Is it the opposite of haunting? An un-haunting?

_What haunted you, Father?_

Bran has been following him again – to the Eyrie and back to Winterfell again, on battlefields and in great halls. As a teenager, Ned lives in the Vale a good half of the time. He spars with Robert Baratheon, who is big and strong, while Ned is lithe and quick. Bran loves to dodge and duck and parry in his father’s body, watching Robert get sweaty and red and burst into laughter, from behind Ned’s grey eyes. At first, he follows Ned into numerous battles, getting a taste of what he otherwise never would. Less and less does it excite him. Battle is ugly and stupid and horrifying. At the Battle of the Bells, Bran sees a man frantically trying to pull his guts back into his body. He sees Denys Arryn dying, lying on his back with an axe still lodged inside him. Before the one who threw it comes to retrieve it, a red bubble emerges from his lips and bursts.[1] Battles are big, red bubbles – clanging and ringing and screams. In the past, courage smells of shitting and dying.

Most often, Bran stays further in the past, when Ned Stark is young, and not in the running to be Lord of Winterfell, which is for his older brother Brandon. He feels the footfalls of a race with Lyanna. At first, he intentionally slows so that she can have a chance to beat him, but Lyanna knows he is cheating for her and becomes angry. When she’s angry she stomps her feet and the sky gets suddenly cloudy. So he runs at his true pace, expecting to leave her in dust, but finds when he reaches the finish line, which is the pool in the Godswood, she is right at his heel. _I am the fastest girl in the kingdoms!_ Lyanna boasts. She might well be. Pride in the past smells like mist and dust.

Right up until they take his head, Ned is haunted. Lyanna’s bed filling suddenly with blood that’s been waiting. A beautiful Dornish lady wearing a purple gown, weeping. _What is that marsh man doing with my baby?_ Her purple eyes aren’t laughing anymore. A crimson cloak, and inside, a broken doll dipped in red, a tiny blue bundle of arms and legs with a red puddle for a head. When Ned sees it, his face turns the color of parchment. Bran hates that look and wants it to stop, but once he is behind his father’s eyes, he understands. The world for women and children is a red puddle.

_Where is Meera now? Show me Meera!_

Instead, he is in a dark room in Winterfell. He knows that room well. It smells ever so slightly of vomit and rot, beneath the scents of lavender, rosemary and mint boiling beside the bed to cover it up. The woman in the bed is Lyarra Stark, but she doesn’t look as Bran has seen her before. Her skin is very yellow, and her fingernails are blue. Her black hair is thin and lays flat against her skull. Lyanna is holding her hand very gently. She is ten years old…barely older than Bran was when everything changed. She wears a very plain brown woolen gown with an apron over it, splotched and stained with vomit and blood. She has been caring for his grandmother, this very young and very lonely girl.

Maester Luwin never talked about how his grandmother passed. A long illness, was all he ever said. Bran has watched Lyarra Stark in the greenhouse, in her garden, tending blue winter roses, pruning away, sometimes leaning over to smell their sweetness. Lyanna’s face when her mother hands her a bouquet is sweetness too. Blue roses, purple petunias, snowy white mums, bluebells. Lyanna isn’t smiling now, as she begs her mother to take the milk of the poppy that a younger Luwin has brought her. _Why be in pain if you don’t have to be, Momma. Momma. Please._ Instead, Lyarra asks her daughter for some more lavender tea with honey. When Lyanna goes to the other end of the room to pour it for her, the girl stops, squeezes out several tears, takes a breath. Then she brings the steaming cup over, places it between her mother’s dry, flaky lips. Finally, the woman in the bed nods, and Luwin lets the drops fall into the cup – one…two…three…another. She drinks, and tells Luwin to bring her lord husband, for the end is near. Bran hears a thunder gathering outside. In the past, loss smells like bluebells and vomit.

Now Lyarra beckons her daughter closer, whispers something in her ear. _My love…my only daughter…how I love you so…seek Martha…in the Wolfswood…and pray to the Old Gods every day…they have a special purpose for you…Martha…the Wolfswood…_

Lord Rickard Stark comes in then, all steel and quiet dignity. His sons come with him, pale. Benjen is little and crying, but very quietly. The thunder outside is louder, the lightning paler when it flashes in the windows. _Have I failed you?_ Lyarra asks, to no one and everyone. _You never did,_ says Bran’s grandfather. _Good_. A flash of lightning, and she reaches out to Lyanna, who again clutches her hand. Then the woman in the bed seems to be trying to call out to someone she has lost, or perhaps screaming in horror at some vision before her. It is hard to know, because her voice has faded to nothing, and all that can be heard is a rasping of breath from her wide-open mouth. Bran knows, however, that she is seeing a wall of ice and a wall of fire side-by-side, magnificent and deadly. If only Bran could tell his aunt, his grandfather, his uncles, that it is not terror in her eyes, not sorrow or pain, but awe and joy. Alas, they will never know. When she dies, Ned Stark runs out of the room, and Benjen breaks down sobbing. Rickard scoops the little boy up silently, and holds him tight. Brandon does nothing – just watches – as Lyanna reaches up and closes her mother’s eyes. Mourning in the past is as impenetrable and unending as a wall of fire, a wall of ice.

Chapter 2: King Bastard

The roof of Sable Hall’s main building had collapsed long ago, and now it had filled with snow, blackened by smoke. Inside, a table had become a fungus-ridden ramp, two legs having rotted and broken off. Mossy chunks of roof had fallen in and collected, caked with yellow, filthy ice. In the corner, a pine tree had sprouted in a pile of pulp and mud. A path cleared in the rubble of broken wood and brick led to another table held up by a couple of stacks of broken stone. Jon stood examining a map of the Wall spread over the top of the table. His raven, King, was perched upon his shoulder, and Satin and Toregg stood at either side of him. Soren, Munda, Morna, Longspear Ryk and Edd Tollett stood around the table as well: a sort of makeshift war council. The next dawn, they would take a squad past the Wall a mile and then west by south to Castle Black, to fight men who had once been his brothers – and that if they were lucky. The other possibility was death by White Walkers, if they had come out of the Haunted Forest with the increasing cold, as Bran warned they might.

They had two mammoths, and they had Wun-Wun and Ghost. One of the mammoths had come with the Hardhome Freefolk, with whom they had met while marching north from Winterfell, as well as another giant, this one named Dok Din Wen Tor. They called him Dok Tor, and he was smaller than Wun Wun but fiercer. Jon had sent him along with Iron Emmett and a crew of the strongest Freefolk Hardhome had given them to the east again, to stop the enemy from making for the sea. Emmett and Edd had led their charges south toward the Dreadfort once it had been confirmed the Boltons were gone. They were urged by Daenerys Targaryen, who had appeared suddenly at Long Barrow along with a massive black dragon, warning them of the threat waiting in the forest. Bran, before leaving with young Griff for Dragonstone, had told Jon, among other things, _The wall is breaking. Many will die, but some will run. Wait for them at the Dreadfort. The will take the Last River. Whatever you do, do not go to the Wall!_ Jon had marched but seven days later.

Pyp, Grenn and two brothers from Eastwatch were with them when they met at the Last River, to Jon’s surprise. It had felt like forever since he had seen young Pyp with his wiggly ears, and the big boy they had sometimes called the aurochs. Jon had become breathless, overexcited, much like when Arya had come home, and like he sometimes did when his wife Val greeted him after a hunt. He had picked Pyp up and swung him around, then tackled Grenn with an embrace that almost made them both tumble over – but the celebration had been short-lived. Eastwatch-by-the-Sea, Pyp told him, had been overrun – not by Wildlings or by wights, but by a small army of Skagossons. Many brothers had been taken off guard and killed, but some had fought brutally before they had escaped and run or gotten captured. They sent ravens to Castle Black as warning. That was before they realized that Castle Black had invited the Stoneborn in the first place. Jon had set up camp for those Hardhome Freefolk who couldn’t fight: children, elderly, the ill and injured. Any who could wield a bow, spear or sword, however, including the women, would march with him to Sable Hall.

By the time they had arrived, it was too late to save anyone, or stop the invaders from continuing on. What they saw was a vision of horror Jon couldn’t have imagined, even in his wolf dreams. The trampled snow around the dilapidated buildings was streaked and splotched with gore, but strangely, there were no bodies anywhere. Only when they wandered quietly, swords drawn and arrows nocked, into the courtyard, did they understand the ghastly truth. A dark red pile at one end of the yard was made of discarded body parts, mainly hands, feet, and most horrifying: backbones… a dozen blood-encrusted backbones. In the center of the yard, the remains of a fire smoldered. In a circle all around, skulls were impaled upon long spikes, with the domes of their skulls removed, the eyeballs still staring in the sockets. Flesh still clung to some of them, even the whole nose in some cases. The mouths hung open and dribbled bloody pulp. Here and there, pink and brown entrails lay in nightmarish blobs, and a trail of bloody bits led out of the gate along with huge paw prints – shadowcat by the shape. Closer to the fire were clusters of bones, picked clean but for a few clinging shreds of meat and gristle. Others still smoked in the fire. Jon had picked one long bone up and smelled it, then dropped it with a yelp. Human. Bones could only be made so clean by burning, he knew, or in this case, cooking. _They ate them_ , Jon had thought, swallowing a howl. Little fires burned in lines leading from the embers of the dying fire – fueled by fat drippings, Jon realized.

A whimpering sound had shaken him from his fury in that moment, and that was when they found the Skagosi girl with a wounded leg. She lay in one of the cells that had recently been occupied. Many of the sleeping cells had crumbled to rubble and were decorated with rotted wood that had once been furniture, and fangs of ice hanging from the eaves and rafters. Only a few had been rebuilt for the purposes of the brothers who may have become a Skagossan’s supper or their captive. The girl was shivering with fever, her ankle twisted, a swelling the size of an apple bulging from it, black with bruising or perhaps corruption. She had two long brown braids, eyes of smoky blue and a long scar that went from the tip of her chin, over her lips and nose, to the edge of her scalp where her hair was parted. When asked, she gave the name Taras. Emmett and Tormund had tried to question her further, but she would tell them nothing. Then Jon had asked to be left alone with the girl.

Once he and Taras had the room, Jon had taken off his cloak and wrapped it around her shoulders. Then he knelt before her, and wiped her sweaty brow with a cloth that Munda had brought, along with a jar containing an acrid-smelling poultice. He clutched the ruined ankle that was probably beyond help and rubbed two bare fingers full of the poultice into the pulsing swollen mass, making Taras suck in a breath. Jon looked up at her and locked her in a challenging gaze.

“They left you,” he said.

“I can’t walk, and they couldn’t spare a horse.”

Jon shook his head. “That isn’t true…surely you weren’t the only one wounded. They abandoned you…why?”

“He was done with me, and after…”

“Who was done?” Jon held her ankle aloft, and pulled a stool over upon which to rest it. Very gently, he continued to massage the swelling. The girl Taras breathed in and out, her eyes taking on the glazed look of delirium. In her state, she was likely to tell much without meaning to, but if he didn’t get the truth from her soon, she would stop making sense.

“Lord of the Deepwood.”

“Lord Crowl…what did he want with you?”

“I’m new wed,” Taras said weakly. “He was taking his right. My husband cast me out, so I followed him. I’m a camp follower now…I…ohhh…”

She bent over in pain, but Jon had lifted her up again softly by the chin. “Lord Crowl will no longer be practicing First Night”

“All the lords do…”

“Not while I am king.”

“Then you must not be king.”

_Indeed_ , Jon thought. He leaned closer to Taras, placing his face very close to hers. “I will take Lord Crowl’s head and consider this his trial, and then we’ll see who the king is after all.”

Taras’s eyes grew wide. “You smell…you smell like animal fur. And the old trees. The ones that bleed red.” She sniffed deep. “You smell like them…and like…fire.”

“You are smelling the cook fire,” Jon said. “Taras, I will take you to the Dreadfort with me if you live, and find a place for you. Just tell me the truth. I will give you Lord Crowl’s skull if you want, but tell me his plan.”

“I don’t want his skull,” Taras said. “I want his brain. There is nothing better than baked brains and butter…” She licked her lips.

Jon shuddered. “I’ll bring you his brain then, and afterward you may have the skull full of ale to wash it down.”

“Make it apple cider and you have a deal, King Bastard.”

Before she had finally lost consciousness, she told Jon that the Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch (Alliser Thorne Jon could reasonably assume) had made a bargain with the Lords of Skagos. The Skagosi had “rescued” three of their brothers who had gone missing, who Jon thought might be from the party he had sent ranging not long before he was murdered. Three from that same party had turned up dead with their eyes gouged out. In exchange for their return, as well as a great cache of obsidian arrowheads and daggers, a load of furs and some barrels of salt fish, Thorne would let them ambush and take any Freefolk garrisoned at the Wall captive to be sold as slaves over the Narrow Sea. Any black brothers who resisted would find themselves enslaved as well if they lived. Thorne planned to man the castles with Southron men, given to him by order of the crown. All the work Jon and Stannis Baratheon had done to make peace with the Freefolk was being undone, and the Wall was crawling with Cersei Lannister’s creatures.

Emmett appealed to Jon to take Pyp and Grenn few other brothers who had come with him to try and head off any Skagosi slave caravans before they got to the shore. This time, they would have a giant and a mammoth with them, in the off chance it wasn’t too late. Jon let them go, still not knowing what he was going to do next. It had only taken a long look in the bright blue eyes of Toregg for him to know he was going to Castle Black. They made their plans in whispered tones, Jon tracing his finger along the long stretch of the Wall that darkened the map. The men and women outside had taken the cannibalized remains and burned it all, but the memory of it would be burned into Jon’s mind for the rest of his days, he knew – which might not be many.

When he laid down in a bed that may have been Halleck’s or some black brother’s not a night past, Jon couldn’t sleep. He shared a bed with Satin, as the available beds were few, and though Satin had offered to take the floor, he would have frozen there. The moon was full. Satin’s back radiated a nice warmth, but Jon’s sorrow was a frozen anvil in his chest. His rage at Cersei festered like a boil inside his brain. Even Ghost’s shadow from outside, where he slept under the window, wasn’t much of a comfort. _We can still go down and force Crowfood to join us_ , Satin said before they went down for the night. It was too late, however. To go all the way south to the Last Hearth would take too much time. By the time Jon forced the Smalljon to fight with them in order to avoid trial, Thorne’s Skaggosons could have stripped the Wall of Tormund Giantsbane’s people…and his.

By now, Arya should have returned from Torrhen’s Square, where she went to deliver Jon’s decree to the smallfolk of the Barrowlands and the Rills. There, she was to recruit envoys to send the same message to any villages served by the Mountain Clans who may still practice First Night. Bran had named the houses Wull, Norrey, and Umber, as well as every house on Skagos, whose lords had taken smallfolk brides on their wedding nights. It began when Jon had determined to outlaw rape among the Freefolk, and Tormund had sworn to enforce it. “Stealing” a woman was the ongoing marriage tradition of the Wildlings, and for the most part, it was only for show. Longspear Ryk had “carried off” Tormund’s own daughter and subsequently married her, having bested Tormund’s sons for her honor. It was obvious that young Munda had wanted Ryk, however – that was plain by the way she looked at him. However, if that hadn’t been the case, she would have had to kill him or submit to him anyway.

Jon had sworn to end the practice of First Night to show he didn’t hold the Freefolk to some stricter standard. First Night was officially outlawed already – the practice only continued because some lords in the North held onto old customs that other kingdoms didn’t, and there were few eyes to catch violators. That changed when Bran gained his third eye, and Jon had no objection to putting an end to that vile custom. However, if he made the decree to the lords themselves, there would only be another yet unspoken decree: that any smallfolk who reported the practice would be punished one way or the other. Therefore, Jon made his intent known only to the people themselves. Certainly if a bride wanted such a “blessing” from her lord, she could take it, but they were under no obligation to grant a lord his right on their wedding night. If the lord otherwise demanded it, he was guilty of rape, and would be brought to trial. If found guilty, that lord would be gelded.

Only when Arya returned to Winterfell would Sansa and Harrold head south with Lord Baelish and his men to attend some festival designed to appease Southrons upset about the destruction of the Sept of Baelor. Sansa and Harrold would stay at Riverrun, where her uncle had installed the Hollow Hill Brotherhood, and they were to negotiate for help with the rebuilding of Winterfell with more followers of the Red God. Petyr would go on to Fairmarket, with Randa Royce posing as his daughter, formerly portrayed in some mummer’s farce by Sansa, for the favor of Queen Myrcella. Jon didn’t fully understand the point of it all, especially since Griff had already pledged to negotiate with Myrcella for the wildfire they needed. For so long, their pack had been separated by Lannister treachery, and now Arya was going to the Rills, Sansa to the Riverlands, Rickon to the Neck, Bran to Dragonstone, and Jon to the Wall. They were as scattered as they had ever been. Jon couldn’t bear to say goodbye to little Rickon again, so he had hugged and kissed the boy as he slept against Shaggy Dog’s black fur, and was gone with the squad before the morning.

Jon lay in the darkness, thinking of his littlest brother, and the three little scars under each of his eyes. Then he thought of Taras and the line down the middle of her face. He rose, leaving Satin asleep on the bed by himself. Ghost was off hunting in the forest. In silence, Jon walked over to the small cell where the girl still slept and opened the door to look in on her. The moonlight poured over the girl’s face, showing her flushed and slick with sweat. Then she sat up, letting the furs fall down around her hips, and squinted her eyes, searching in the dark for whoever was there. Her tunic laces had come undone, and a soft white breast peeked through, the nipple pink like a little rosebud. Jon felt desire rising in him, but remembered he was a man wed with a son or daughter on the way.

Then suddenly, a terrible, rending pain fired its way through his bones and muscles, and a tingling covered his skin. When a sharp pain struck his fingers and toes, he looked down at his hands to see long hard claws bursting forth from the tips of his fingers. Whitish hair was sprouting from the back of his hands, long and wiry. An agony seized his face, as he felt his jaw lengthening and fangs emerging from his gums. His tailbone grew and elongated itself into a tail that whipped back and forth behind him. His ears twisted and grew, and his muscles morphed and burst through his jerkin, wrenching him down into a crouch. He felt the slaver fall from his jaws as all of his clothes fell away, revealing only thick, white-grey fur. Taras screamed in terror, and then Jon woke up.

Next to him in the bed, Satin stirred and blinked. “Boss? What is it…is there trouble?”

Jon was soaked with sweat, and now he shivered violently when he felt the cold. He put his hands to his face and felt it was flat and smooth but for his small short beard.

“Always,” he said.

“Now and Always!” King squawked.

Chapter 3: The Raven

At sea, the weirwoods are far off, and at last my mind is quieted of Griff’s fever dreams. Those who reject fear always have the most fearful nightmares, especially after a dose of milk of the poppy and a swig or two of dream wine. When he finally slept, and that wasn’t until we made it to the ship, a fierce and terrible lion savaged young Griff’s chest and tore out his innards. This lion had six wings, two huge and brown like a griffin, two small and black like Jon Snow’s raven, and two webbed and scaly like a dragon. It had eight bright blue eyes. It moved as fast as sound, and when Griff went for his sword, he found it was made of wood, like a child’s toy. It burned to ash in the beast’s hot breath. As the thing ate him slowly, he called out for the mother he thinks he never knew.

I warned him, and never meant for this to happen.

This clumsy plan will only help the wild one, who I have grown to like.

As we drew close to White Harbor, I heard it – the whispering of the trees. _The green fire awaits at the Harbor._ Cersei Lannister’s plan to set Griff’s fleet ablaze would have been a disaster – for Griff and for me. He must stay alive…for a while. Furthermore, that wildfire must come north – and now it will, but not as Cersei thought. When I told young Griff what awaited us, he did what Griff will do. Perhaps this experience will teach him better.

“If you move the ships now to Oldcastle, they will be safe,” we told him. “We can get there in time and set sail before the Lannister fleet even knows we’ve slipped them.”

“Send birds to the ships and to Winterfell now!” Griff ordered, then he looked at us. “If this is true, and you’ve saved our fleet, I owe you and your brother more than a bunch of black glass…”

Griff does not believe Jon about the Others. He believes that Jon believes, but his faith stops there. It was Ser Barristen Selmy who convinced him to dig into the Dragonmont.

_Your lord father told me there is a tremendous amount of it beneath the mountain..._

_Why am I sitting here talking about glass? My enemies are gaining, and now I have a rebellion on my hands…_

_Which is why I was speaking of Jon Snow…a rebel who may become an ally…_

_What does the King in the North want with dragonglass? I thought he needed fire._

_Ser Loras heard from Snow’s henchman that it can be used to kill…to destroy these Others, and maybe their footsoldiers._

_You don’t believe this about Others and wights…do you?_

_I’d like to believe he’s wrong, but I don’t think he’s a liar. He is his father’s son…that I can tell. But it’s no matter. We don’t have to believe him. Let him mine the dragonglass. If Snow is wrong, it’s worthless. You didn’t even know it was there. It’s nothing to you. Give him something by giving him nothing…take a step toward a more productive relationship with a possible subject and ally…_

_I suppose it would keep him occupied… **[2]**_

So that you can negotiate with Sansa…yes oh yes. A rift is ripe for opening!

We could have warned Sansa about your mother, but she did not ask.

After the birds had flown, Griff got to thinking – something he should let his advisors do. He determined that they should go to White Harbor anyway and attempt to apprehend the wildfire. They had the Golden Company, he reasoned, and the advantage of surprise.

“They won’t be expecting _us_ to attack _them_ …and then that’s less wildfire in Myrcella’s hands,” he told his kingsguard.

“Forgive me, my king,” Ser Loras said. “But you didn’t see the Battle of the Blackwater…we must be _exceedingly careful_ not to ignite it.”

“Be careful then…and when we have the wildfire, we can mount an attack on Euron Greyjoy. It could be our only hope to take on that villain.”

“What about Jon Snow and his army of the dead?”

Griff rolled his eyes. “When we take King’s Landing and he bends the knee, he can have as much as he wants…we owe him that much. Loras, please…you didn’t really think I was going to give over a cache of wildfire to a rebel, did you?”

Ser Loras was much troubled by this. He spent a deal of time in Satin’s bed, and learned much and more about the Northern king. Satin reminds him of Renly, except for his eyes, which are nearly black in the dim of the evening. His skin tasting of pinecones and his beard perfumed with geranium and bee balm. _Whatever you desire is my pleasure, my lord…anything you want_ , Satin said in a tone less like the man of the Watch and more like the whore of Oldtown. Then when they lay abed, he told Loras stories that could not have been made up. Ser Loras yielded to his king, however.

The ambush was successful at first. Griff’s men took the crew of the two shabby dromonds by surprise, and forced them off the ship. Cersei thinks they were commandeered by Aurane Waters, but Waters never did return from the Step Stones, or wherever he went. I can’t see him any more than I can see young Dany…they are out of our sight. I know, however, that he is not in King’s Landing, and that Cersei spends her nights with many others who are not there. Still, she will sentence those who fail her to torment and death in the laboratory of her necromancer, especially without the Queen there to prevent her. Driven by fear, a man will do much.

One such man sent a pot of wildfire catapulting toward the flanks of Griff’s troops, and a confusion ensued. Then a flaming arrow took flight. We escaped harm, but many of the Golden Company did not. Lomas Estermont did not. The green flame that engulfed him melted him like spun sugar. Some of the conflagration caught Griff, and though the blaze was put out, the heat did not cool. Griff screamed and kicked, clawing at his breastplate with Ser Rolly’s frantic help. Duck hurled the breastplate away, burning his palm. Underneath, Griff’s doublet and shirt had burned away, and the breastplate had seared the sigil of the dragon into his skin. One long fierce dragon’s head, scored in bright red across his torso, curls its jaws around his nipple. Its claw clutches his navel.

Duck’s hand matches Jon Snow’s.

They managed to hijack one dromond, but the other made it to the Three Sisters in retreat, and with the prince so wounded, they let it go and sent a another bird to Winterfell, having gotten from one of the crew that the payload was destined for the castle. Griff was placed on the old dromond along with us, and we sailed to Oldcastle to wait for the company to meet them. It was a good thing, for Griff may not have made it on foot to the old stronghold. The servant girl wrapped his torso in linen and applied a cooling salve of aloe, but nothing more could be done. The fever set in as soon as we set sail, Griff shaking violently and swearing at the dead men who reached for him and pawed his face with their rotting hands. He saw himself a rabble piece atop a giant cyvasse board. A noseless, laughing dwarf, whose thumb was bigger than Griff’s head, pushed him from tile to tile. Griff screamed. He swore. He moaned in pain as his Hand and the Lord Commander looked on helplessly. _Just wait until Lemore learns of this,_ Duck said under his breath. _I am going to get it!_

I didn’t see a reason, given the situation, to tell Griff of Jon’s victory at the Wall. I expressly told the prince not to go in an effort to assure he went, which worked like a charm. Of course, I thought he would not return, and I grieved for his loss.

In another time, he could have been among the Great Bastards of the ruling dragons.

Perhaps I knew he would not die…perhaps I let this happen.

The attack on Castle Black was triumphant, in good part due to the black brothers who still had love for Jon Snow. Alliser Thorne had never inspired such love, and now he was dead for it. They soon had Thorne’s men surrounded, and they headed the Skags off as they came through, carrying the Freefolk from Icemark.

Most of the Stoneborn were killed…a few were escaped or captured. They had sacrificed the black brothers who resisted them, and cannibalized the Wildlings, who were not good enough for the Old Gods, but good enough for a stew. Jon took the lords of houses Magnar, Stane and Crowl for ransoming.

He saw the huge boy, the one who’s often slow on the uptake, take a spear through the back. As he died, Jon held him, and when the breath left him, he howled into his barrel chest. After, he cut Lord Crowl of Deepdown’s head from his neck, then hacked off the top of his skull and poured the brains into his palm.

Hobb’s face when he told him to wash the lord’s brain and throw it in a pan with butter is something I will carry with me to cheer me when I am feeling low.

Thorne’s intestines, by the way, are inside Ghost’s intestines!

I ask you, what god or killer was ever so powerful as the wolves and dragons whose blood flows in those veins![3]

Not only alive, but aware of the intrusion of slavery in this land, as he hasn’t been previously. This ruins my plan, or changes it, at least.

He wrote a letter to her. _With our eyes shut tight, I can read it_ …

_Queen Daenerys,_

_I received your message regarding the army of the dead, and return heartfelt thanks for taking the risk to warn us. I have also heard news of the dead gathering in the gorge west of the wall. I propose to construct of curtain of fire, built of old wood, stone, and tallow, from the Shadow Tower and extending through Queenscrown south of the wall to prevent further movement. With time, I mean to extend this fire to span the north of Westeros. As you may have been told, the Wall is not staffed as it once was, and we only have a few men with whom to labor upon this wall. We need workers, and of course, we need fire._

_The people of the North have named me their king, and I accepted in order to unite my people against a near insurmountable foe. I mean not to disrupt your peace, or that of your nephew, who has proven generous in our negotiations. However our relations, and the history between our families, I beg humbly of you to send laborers from among your freed people. For as long as I can, I will pay and feed them._

_Come to Westeros, your grace, and help defend our people from the Others and their army. Should you do so, I will come to the East and fight the forces of slavery with all my power. Together, we will end this cruel institution and blot its vile practitioners from the earth forever. I swear this on my life, on my family, and on the North itself._

_Sincerely,_

_Jon Snow, King in the North_

Chapter 4: Jaime

The rug beater made a satisfying sound when Jaime landed a blow on the old rug – it was like a punch in the face: a thick, dull banging. The thing was made of stiff reeds in a looped knot shaped like a heart, with a wooden handle. Jaime had never considered such objects before. Since arriving at Winterfell with Brienne and Podrick, he had been made aware of all sorts of common instruments: the thin steel poles used for thatch weaving, the wide flat knife used for patching holes with clay and mud, the wooden pegs used to pin clothes to a line. Winterfell was still half a ruin, and the chores of rebuilding were done in the courtyard out in the open. They had waited some time outside the south gate before the green-looking guards let them into the castle, and Jaime had consented to be chained, though he was linked to Pod by his remaining hand. The buck-toothed young guard who had chained them apologized to Brienne and Pod, but not to him.

The rug hanging from the line was woven of gray and white wool, the direwolf in Stark colors howling in its center. Jaime was dressed in a rough spun tunic and a pair of warm wool breeches, gray except where they were besmirched with the dirt and soot of the old castle. Quite possibly, his Lannister crimson had been thrown in a fire, his golden armor melted down in the new smithy’s. It occurred to Jaime that the motion he made with his left hand to swing the rug beater wasn’t far from a stroke with his sword, so he swung with all his might and called it an opportunity to strengthen what would now be his only sword arm. Indeed it started to ache, the same way it did when he practiced it the godswood with Arya Stark.

Lady Stark had looked much like a woman grown when he and Brienne were brought before her in the lord’s solar. She was still quite small – the back of her late father’s chair loomed well above her head – but her long face was stern and looked far afield from the sweaty, adolescent one that had gazed down at him in his room in the Red Keep. She wore a gown of wool dyed black as pitch, with square shoulders and a high neck, and long sleeves that split down the center at the crook of her elbow, cinched at the waist with a brown leather belt. Sewn on her chest in shiny beads of polished ebony was the Stark wolf, embellished with little weirwood leaves embroidered in blood red. Did she wear black in mourning for her father and brother, Jaime had wondered? Truthfully, with her shiny brown hair pulled back into a tightly wound braid, she looked every bit the lady of a great house, with very little to hint of the brutal and merciless killer she was. She drummed her fingers, gloved in a wine-like red, against Ned Stark’s table, and glared at him.

“I’m told you surrendered Casterly Rock to my uncle Brynden, Ser. Is this true?” Lady Arya asked, her tone revealing no particular emotion.

“It is…in exchange for my life,” he answered.

“Sad…that has very little value here.”

“I’m afraid what I’m about to tell you isn’t going to increase it for you…”

“I’m on the edge of my seat, Ser.”

He had looked at Brienne one last time before he spoke again. Brienne gave him a nod, though her face was pale. They hadn’t spoken much about what transpired between them at the Rock as a result of Euron Greyjoy’s spell. It was sorcery – that was all. Still, the memory of kissing her wasn’t repulsive to him, and some nights, as he slept on the cold ground in some abandoned hovel on the road north, he had caught himself thinking of the way her big arms felt wrapped around him.

“Your brother Brandon…is he…well?” Jaime asked.

“As far as I know. We had to give him up to prince Aegon to hostage. Why do you ask?”

“Hostage?” Brienne broke in. “Where has he gone?”

“South…that’s all I can tell you. Why are you asking about my brother?”

_South…so he was here, but now he is gone. I’ve failed Rhaegar again_. “I’m afraid I have something to confess about the injury that crippled him – which is that…I gave him that injury.”

Arya looked to laugh for a brief moment, but when she saw he was not joking, she stood up very abruptly and placed a hand on her belt. There was a rather gorgeous jeweled dagger tucked into it, and Jaime half expected her to throw it into his eye, but she wasn’t so ungentle as that. She drew the dagger and asked him politely to take a knee, like a true princess. In that moment, Brienne had stood and appealed to the lady with all her heart, pleading for his life with urgency. She told Arya how he had saved her in the bear pit of the Brave Companions, and that he had given her the sword, Oathkeeper, that she might rescue Sansa Stark. She swore that the man who had thrown Bran from the window of that tower no longer existed.

“Here!” Brienne said, kneeling before the princess. “This sword was made from your father’s greatsword, Ice.” She drew Oathkeeper and held it out in the palms of her hands. “Take it, and keep the sword your guards confiscated from Ser Jaime. It is named…it is the other half of Ice. Jaime took it from the Red Keep to give back to your family.”

“It may not matter, and I understand if it doesn’t, but for what it’s worth I regret deeply what I did,” Jaime said. “…and I don’t say that often.”

“You’re right – it doesn’t matter,” Arya said, but she sheathed the dagger. “But as much as I’d prefer to open your throat right here and now, I am not to make such decisions without the leave of my brother the king, who is on a mission north. Not without a trial…”

Jaime knelt too and bowed his head. “I am grateful for this mercy, your grace…you are your father’s daughter, then.”

Arya nodded. Until such time he was to be tried, or King Jon returned, when he would doubtless use “Widow’s Wail” to hack off his head, Jaime was locked in the dungeons. Before she left him in his cell, Arya had stood over him and peered down as she had in his crimson and gold bed so many months previous. Jaime lifted his head, forcing himself to look into those gleaming gray eyes.

“Can I ask you why?” Arya asked.

“For love,” he said. “Bran saw Cersei and me in the tower…naked.”

“So. It is true that Cersei’s children are yours, and not the true heirs to the throne.”

“My children are blameless. They didn’t ask to be born.”

“Why are you here, then? Did Brienne put you up to this?”

“We are both here to pledge our service to your family…Brienne in honor of Catelyn. Myself to right the wrongs of my house.”

“You would turn your cloak on House Lannister?”

“Already done. There is nothing I can do for Cersei now anyway, is there?”

Arya shook her head. “Your sister wasn’t born a monster. She was made one[4] as a girl…by the actions of one who was supposed to protect her.” She leaned over and put her face close to his. “If you had loved her… _you would have let her alone_!”

Then she walked out, closing the heavy door behind her, leaving Jaime in darkness. He had contemplated her words for many days – he lost count of how many. Servants brought jugs of water and bowls of porridge or barley mush every once and while, and brought him a new bucket for pissing and shitting. Brienne visited often, and told him of the things that had transpired at Winterfell after the Boltons were cast out. Much of it was interesting. Some of it was quite unbelievable. At some point, Jaime was released and again brought before the princess in her solar. Several humble smallfolk were gathered, a couple of which had brought him breakfast at one time or another. They glared at him, some staring at his gold hand and whispering. The Hound stood among them in his robe, and nodded when Jaime caught his eye.

“Now then, Ser Jaime,” Arya said. “I’ve decided it’s rather a waste to keep a strong man in the dungeons when there’s so much to be done. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Winterfell needs a bit of work.”

“Well truth be told, your grace, I haven’t had a chance to look around, but certainly I can imagine,” said Jaime.

“Brother Sandor, what is your least favorite task here at the castle?”

The Hound rubbed his chin for a moment. “I’d have to say scrubbing floors. Makes my knees hurt something awful,” he told her.

“Very good. Hother…what about you? Your least favorite.”

“Why that’s chamber pots, your grace.”

“And you, Neddy?”

One by one, she asked the crew of servants what chore they hated most, never once having to ask a name, which was impressive. Jaime couldn’t remember the name of a single servant he’d ever known, if he’d known their names in the first place. Most of them answered, _chamber pots_ or _the privy_ , but one said _beating rugs_ , and another said _chopping wood_. A stout girl called Maddy had answered, _hanging wet clothes_ , before Arya had even gotten the question out. Once the poll was taken, Arya had assigned Jaime to each chore mentioned, which he proceeded to do with diligence, one-handed, for several weeks. Immediately, his fare in the dungeon went from porridge to fish stew with turnips and carrots, and even a boiled potato or brown bread with butter. In a short time, he was released from the dungeons altogether, and allowed to take a room in the guards’ hall with Brienne and Pod, who swore to keep him under watch. He wasn’t allowed to dine in the hall or roam the courtyard, but every few days, the princess escorted him into the Godswood, where she tossed him Widow’s Wail and invited him to spar with her, as two large guards and a dark-haired lady-in-waiting looked on. Her skill at swordplay was superb, and Jaime realized she was helping him get better with his left. He could barely believe it. When he asked her who taught her to fight so, she had only said, _no one_. [5]

After he had beaten what must have been every dirty rug in the North, princess Arya strode toward him again. His left arm was throbbing, and Jaime knew he could look forward to a regular drubbing. Then, however, he saw her lady’s maid did not carry his sword with her. He bowed and bid her good morning, but she wasted no time with small talk.

“Your daughter, or more probably your sister, sent two ships packed with wildfire to White Harbor…they meant to attack young Griff.”

Jaime’s heart sank. _Winterfell, Rhaegar, you said come to Winterfell!_ Then he realized she said “meant to.”

“Is the prince all right?”

Arya told him they had re-routed the ships, and though the prince was wounded, they had gotten a load away from them. As of the last raven, Griff was alive, but burned. “But there’s another load coming this way up the White Knife,” she said.

“If you please, your grace, I wouldn’t count on that. They will have expected a bird to warn us,” said Jaime.

“They sent a bird before they reached the harbor. Bran knew, you see. Still, scouts are out there now, and when we find out which we they’re going, we’re going to get that wildfire…and you’re going to help us.”

Jaime nodded, but he couldn’t hide his amazement. _Bran knew._ How? How was that possible?

[1] Rawls, Wilson, _Where the Red Fern Grows_ , 1961. (My teacher read this aloud to our class in 4th grade. I remember this part more than any other. I can even hear my teacher’s voice when she read it.)

[2] Benioff, David and D.B. Weiss, _Game of Thrones_ , Season 7, Episode 3: “The Queen’s Justice,” HBO, 2017.

[3] Coppola, Francis Ford, _Bram Stoker’s Dracula_ , Columbia, 1992.

[4] Demme, Jonathan. _Silence of the Lambs_ , Orion, 1991.

[5] Benioff & Weiss. _Game of Thrones_ , Season 7, Episode 4: “The Spoils of War,” HBO, 2017.

**Author's Note:**

> I am writing in a limited POV style like Martin's, which is a suffocating way to write. I have thought of a lot of neat scenes that don't fit into the POV limits I set for myself, or don't move the story along quickly enough to include in the series. I will write these out if someone requests it. If you like this story, and would like to see a scene that got skipped or glossed over, OR that is in the POV of someone who is not a Stark, Targaryen, Baratheon, Greyjoy, or Lannister, let me know what you'd like to see, and I will make a Wheel of Westeros B-side out of it.


End file.
